


Never Yours

by amorae



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, SBURB, Sadstuck, alpha dave being sad and alpha dave-y, also there is some roxy and rose, and dirk being mentioned, and roxy being sad, i'm gonna stop tagging useless nonsense, just so you guys know, major sadstuck, no really i'm not kidding this is some serious sadstuck, post sburb?, short gen fic, uhm i don't know what else to tag this as??, warning for inappropriate language, warning for sad, with rose being rose-y
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-05
Updated: 2012-07-04
Packaged: 2017-11-09 04:58:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/451560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amorae/pseuds/amorae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are the alpha kid, and you are preparing for the child that was never really yours.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Have To Do

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SubjectEmpire (Onceyourempire)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Onceyourempire/gifts).



> I felt bad for not posting anything like, all term (thanks to a HEAVY AS HELL WORK SCHEDULE and writers block) so here's something I whipped up a few months ago and only posted to Tumblr because I didn't like it all that much. 
> 
> This one is Dave/Dirk. So...enjoy.

Your name is Dave Strider, and you are preparing for the child that never was. 

You suppose that is an appropriate twist of fate: the first time in your life you ever get _excited_ about something, only to have it slip through your open palms. Your name is Dave Strider and you should know better than to ever get excited about anything. Bro taught you better than that. Don’t expect anything from life and you’ll never be disappointed.

Regardless, it’s still difficult. It’s still difficult to realize that after all this time warming up to the idea, to getting excited over the idea that you might actually get to raise the asshole who raised you, that you won’t actually have this opportunity at all. It’s difficult to realize that, no, you’ll never get to know your Bro for who he actually was (as opposed to the figure from your past and from your memories). It’s difficult to realize that you won’t ever get to become best friends with your Bro, you’ll never get to know what made him tick, and you’ll never get him back. Your bro isn’t dead, not really—he’s just not around during your current timeline. 

You’d be lying if you said that you weren’t angry with him, sometimes. You don’t really know what time period Bro would be born in, but you assume that by that point, the world would have developed time travel or some shit like that. At the very least, he should be able to communicate with you.

Fuck. If a bunch of homicidal aliens were able to communicate with you and your buds in the past, shouldn’t he be able to communicate with you, too? 

Maybe he doesn’t want to meet you. Maybe he doesn’t think it’s important.

There will be no happy reunion where you find a baby in a smoking crater, a baby that is undeniably yours. There will be no happy childhood full of sleepless nights while you try desperately to get the little asshole to fall asleep despite his best efforts to stay up all night tinkering with the way your sunglasses work. There will be nothing except empty promises and broken dreams, dreams you didn’t even know you _had._

Is it really so bad to realize that you’ll never have something that was never really yours to begin with?

When the anger fades and your frustration turns into a dull, aching sadness, you start wondering how you can help the little guy out. You know what the future holds. You know what is going to happen. Any help that you might be able to provide will be help much needed.

Your first order of business: buy out the entire apartment complex. The landlord gives you a strange look, but doesn’t question you. Honestly, who would question a famous movie director with a wad of cash clutched tightly in a gnarled palm with the implication of paying you for a crummy complex? 

Once the apartment complex is successfully held within your name, you start stockpiling the house with food. Luckily, you live in America, where most of the food is nonperishable and should withstand upwards of 500 years. You pack a lot of ramen into the cabinets, smirking as you do so, wondering if anime will still be around when your Bro finally makes it to the apartment. 

You leave lists out for the kid, hoping that maybe they’ll help him out. You write out instructions on where to find the swords, how to hack the TV into a giant computer monitor, and even do him the favor of writing down his favorite animes. You can’t help but smile the smallest bit as you write out a long list of unsavory animes that you’re sure will be difficult to find.

But Bro’s a smart guy. He’ll figure it out. 

In your movies, you leave subliminal messages for him to find, hoping that he’ll be smart enough to decode them. You think back to the hazy memories of your childhood and to the manchild that raised you. You fill your movies with plush puppet rump, hoping he’ll realize you put all these ( _fucking_ ) puppets in the movies for him. 

There are a lot of strange crevices in the apartment, and you stuff Bro’s favorite smuppets that you’ve kept lying around for old times sake into those various hidey-holes. Long, phallic noses create somewhat bizarre shadows in the corners of the room, and if you let yourself grow lazy and drowsy, the shadows remind you of the times Bro would wake you up at the crack of dawn by showering you with his favorite puppets.

You pick up Lil’ Cal and hold him in your hands, staring at him intently as you wonder where the safest place to hide him might be. His eyes stare glassily at you, and while in the past that gaze might have frightened you, now it fills you with nostalgia and hope. Surely, a younger Bro will adore this damn puppet just as much as your Bro did. 

So you shove the freaky thing in the fridge, where a normal family might hide their dozen eggs or their deli meats. _Fuck food_ , you think: Lil’ Cal is definitely more important. 

There are times when you consider leaving notes for your brother that go beyond instructions and lists of his favorite things and where to find all the hidden secrets the apartment holds. There are times where you write out long, angsty letters to a brother who taught you the art of disinterest, where you scold him for his lack of attempts at getting to know you. You write about how much you miss him, and how much you, yes, you _love_ him, although you know that your Bro would have kicked your ass off the roof of the complex if you had ever said that to him in the past. You write these letters and hold the pages in your hands, staring down at them and wondering their merit. Eventually, you pt them in the trash, knowing that they don’t even come close to explaining how you feel. 

Bro was never yours to raise, and you know that. He was always his own independent person, the type of adult to take a challenge like an abandoned baby as a joke while being the most kick ass parent any kid could ever wish for. You hoped to repay the favor, but this will have to do.


	2. Mother's Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You are the beta kid, and you are pining for the mother that was never yours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SECOND CHAPTER WOO
> 
> I wrote this one kind of for my own mom, who I've been estranged from for a year. The Lalonde relationship really hits me close to home as a result. This was a mothers day thing that I posted to tumblr and it didn't get many notes because y'know, Lalondes aren't nearly as sexy as Striders. But here you go!
> 
> This one is Roxy/Rose.

Your name is Roxy LaLonde and today is just fucking great. 

 

==> Pour yourself another drink. You deserve it.

 

Damn right you do. You take one look at the bottle of gin on the table in front of you and, with the smallest grimace, pick it up by its neck. For a split second you consider actually mixing yourself a martini, but the thought dissipates quickly. Instead, you pop the lid of the bottle of gin and pound back a particularly large gulp of the bitter liquid. 

It burns all the way down, lighting a fire in the pit of your stomach that is familiar and comforting. You spin on your heel, turning away from the table to face the sparse remains of your home. 

You imagine that a few centuries ago, the house was quite a sight to behold. Now, it was decrepit, barely standing, with mould-choked walls and rotting wood as far as the eye can see. Appliances are cracked and old, but still work well enough to be of some use in your life. 

You take another swig of the gin, squinting your eyes against the burn. The world spins slowly when you open them, and you realize that you are, all things considered, quite drunk. 

This house was your mother’s house, centuries ago, when the Batterwitch was not yet a threat. Sometimes you like to imagine what she was like during those days. She was a writer (albeit, her writing was thick and difficult, and was a little heavy with wizards) with an apparent penchant for purple (if you are able to make that judgment based on the décor in the house that has survived). 

Another gulp down the hatchet. The world is starting to run together, like liquid, spilling into the edges of your peripheral vision. Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth and your limbs drag. You manage to pull yourself to the crumbling couch, throwing yourself against it while tucking the bottle of gin close to your stomach. 

If nothing else, the gin is a pretty good cuddle partner. 

Today is just fucking great. Because you know, that during your mom’s time, today’s date would have been a holiday called “mothers day.” Of course people in this time don’t celebrate it—the Batterwitch surely condemned it a long time ago as being obscene—but it doesn’t mean that hints of it don’t appear in secret. You first heard about it from Jane, who had been lamenting some years ago that she didn’t know who her mother was and therefore could not celebrate the holiday. Since then, you had always wondered what it would have been like to have a mother’s day with Rose. 

Or, fuck. Just. Even what it was like to have a mom. 

You find yourself crying, and you lift a lethargic hand to wipe the tears away. There really is no use in crying, after all. Crying isn’t going to bring Rose to this timeline, or you to hers. Crying isn’t going to solve any of your damn problems.

It’s a struggle, but you manage to pull yourself into an upright position. You stare obliquely at the wall in front of you, half attempting to read the spines of the books that litter the various bookshelves. The books are all books she left behind, of course. Books that had been hidden in the house, away from the Batterwitch (who would have surely destroyed them if she had found them), waiting for you, apparently. 

Would Rose have been a kind mom? Would she have cared for you? Would she have loved you? Would she have held you when you cried? Or would she have pushed you away in an attempt to teach you to deal with your own problems? 

The thoughts circle around and around in your head as you glare at the bookshelf directly in front of you. Tears blur your vision (and the alcohol certainly doesn’t help), and an overwhelming sense of defeat washes over you. Despite the warmth of being drunk, you feel cold and lonely and more than anything, lost. 

There’s no point in romanticizing the mom you will never get to meet. The most of what you know of your mom is basic history—things Dirk has told you about both of your guardians. Like the fact that she fought until the bitter end, that she was solemn and bookish, that she had a penchant for psychology and supernatural fiction, and that she was famous for writing literature about wizards having sex. You’ve concluded from reading her books that she was snarky and had a particular bitter quality to the way she wrote. She seemed angry, but was quiet in her fury. 

You can’t help but wonder, though. If you ever had the chance to meet her, would that snarkiness translate to you? Would she be happy to meet you, to have you, or would she remain indifferent and cold? 

A mother that never was is still a mother, after all. And while doubt and insecurity does trickle in on occasion, you’ve developed a hero-like image of your mom in your mind. In your mind, Rose was kind. You believe that if she were to have raised you, she would have hugged you often, and loved you to the best of her ability. She wouldn’t have let you fall into the trap of alcoholism (which, speaking of alcohol, you’ve taken quite a few more sips since falling into this train of thought). She would have reassured you that all of your insecurities, while valid, weren’t necessary. She would have held your hand throughout the hardships you’ve endured, and would have fought by your side at every opportunity. 

You stand up and take staggering steps towards the bookshelf, finally latching yourself onto one of the shelves to steady your position. If Rose had been here, she would have caught you. She would have pushed your hair back and looked you in the eyes and told you that it was going to be okay. She would have…

A title on the shelf catches your attention and draws it away from your inner monologue. The book looks like it had once been black, but now it’s covered in layers of dust. Yet you can still make out the title, and it makes no sense to you.

“Grimoire?” you say, out loud, trying to sound out the vowels. Your voice sounds slurred, even to yourself, and you place the gin down on the shelf before taking a closer look at the book.

 

==> Take the book off the shelf and look at it.

 

You lift the book off the shelf as gingerly as you can, afraid it may crumble after years of being untouched and left to rot on the shelf. It’s sturdy, and it appears that the cover is made of leather. It’s heavy and huge. The pages look brittle, and you’re a little afraid to open the cover. 

With careful precision, you pull the cover open, only to find a slip of yellowed-paper hidden between the cover and the first page. 

Your heart stops. It’s folded neatly in half, but you can see where ink had seeped through the thin material. There’s clearly hand writing, and it’s clearly not attached to the book. 

You pull the slip out of the book slowly, and then place the Grimoire down on the ground beside you. 

It feels as if your heart is going to beat out of your chest. The anxiety is helping you swim through the haze of alcohol and you feel almost sober as you stare down at the small slip of paper in your hands.

You unfold it, worried that it might crack due to its age. It doesn’t, and instead reveals to you a letter written in loopy handwriting with purple ink. 

The letter is, of course, addressed to you. 

_Dearest Roxy,_

_I have no way of knowing when you’ll read this letter. I hope that it finds you in good health. I wish I could say that I hope it finds you in happiness, but I can guess that happiness more than likely eludes you in your time._

_I know that my absence has probably weighed heavily upon you for some time, now. Believe me when I say that Dave and I have tried everything we can to reach you and Dirk, but there is simply no way we can travel that far in time with our current state of technology. We were heartbroken when we discovered that there was a very little chance we would ever get to meet each of you._

_I think about you a lot, Roxy. Since I’ve known that I will never get to meet your acquaintance, I’ve developed somewhat romantic ideas of what you must be like in my mind. I hope that you are just as smart as I know you are. I hope that you do not let depression keep you from working with ectobiology, or any science that you might find interesting. I hope that you do not let yourself succumb to alcoholism, although no one would ever condemn you if you did._

_I find myself wishing that someday I could hug you and tell you in person that I am sorry I could not have been a better mother. My mother was cold and absent, but at least her presence was known from time to time. I always promised myself that I would be a better mother than my mother was, but I guess that simply wasn’t my fate._

_Please take care of yourself, daughter. Know that no matter what, and no matter how many years have passed, I love you. I tried to prepare the house as best I could for your arrival. It may not be as comfortable as I would have liked, but it should, at the very least, be adequate. I tried to leave behind a legacy you could be proud of, a memory you could cling to and use as a base for any fictional mother figure you may have molded for yourself in the time you’ve been alive. It may not be much, but I do hope that the things I have accomplished bring you some comfort._

_More than anything, Roxy, I want you to know that I love you. I have never met you, and I will never get to know what you look like, or what your favorite color is, or anything as mundane as that. Yet I love you all the same._

_Take care of yourself as best you can, and know that I am fighting for you each and every day._

_With all my love,  
Rose _

You sit for a long time, staring at the letter, before you finally let yourself cry.


End file.
